Mad Love for Confusion

I wrote this a month or two ago and have hesitated to put it out there, because I’ve experienced a whirlwind of change and clarity since then. But, I read this today and realized it doesn’t matter…that was my Truth then and there are some valid points about confusion that will always be true…the confusion led me to the new clarity…and I’ll write about that soon 😉

“Multitudes follow spiritual pathways, but scarce are the ones who finally succeed and realize the ultimate Truth. Why is that? We follow ritual and dogma and zealously practice spiritual discipline—and we crash once again! Even when it works, the ego quickly comes in and we are caught in pride and smugness, thinking we have the answers. Oh, Lord, save us from the ones who have the answers! Save us from the righteous! Save us from the do-gooders!

Confusion is our salvation. For the confused, there is still hope. Hang on to your confusion. In the end it is your best friend, your best defense against the deathliness of others’ answers, against being raped by their ideas. If you are confused, you are still free.”

-David Hawkins, Letting Go

When I first read this quote, my heart quickened, and I felt myself inwardly jumping for joy.I think it was because this was the first time I ever read anything commending me for being confused…and I am often confused.I have breaks and periods of peace where I enjoy how far I’ve come but then it is right back to the sinking feeling of all of the ‘shoulds’ racing through my head at once.Confusion returns again and again.Before reading Letting Go, I had never even entertained the idea of gratitude for my confusion.I never even entertained the idea of accepting it or even allowing it.I now realize that it is these times of confusion that have motivated me over and over again to seek answers to my endless questions, to seek Truth and to seek the wisdom in my experiences…and then to integrate that wisdom into my daily life.But I run into blocks…I get stuck in places of indecision and confusion where I lack clarity and balance.And I don’t know why (or I refuse to accept or see why…and I don’t know why I do that either)… I am confused right now. I wonder about the choices I make and why.I don’t always understand my decisions. I have a lot of questions about a lot of them.What are my choices telling me about my inner state? What do they say about my subconscious beliefs? Do I have any incorrectly learned beliefs that lead to choices that lead to negative experiences? Or is it merely my perception of these experiences (or all experience) that needs to change? What perceptions are available and how are they attainable? What perception will lead me to my greatest contentment and is that perception in line with the greater good?

What comforts me during periods of confusion is the awareness of a pattern of personal growth in my life.First, I feel a sense of confusion and of being lost.I feel discontent in this state. I have (multiple times) suffered greatly for extended periods of time before I allow myself to see the Truth that I have resisted out of fear.The ego comes up with powerful and creative ways of causing us to resist seeing the Truth.It believes that the Truth will hurt, that it will make us feel shame or sadness, that it will reveal our unworthiness, or maybe that it will completely destroy us altogether.Yet, the opposite has proven true time and time again.When the Truth is accepted…suffering ends.

So, it is fortuitous then that these periods of confusion happen in that they lead to periods of questioning and contemplating…and seeking… which always leads to finding.

At a certain point on this path complacency became impossible, even when the idea of feeling complacent sounded appealing.I developed a passionate addiction for Truth that has grown and grown and continues to grow as I experience its vast benefits and power.So many of us are filled with an undefinable longing, a thirst that is unquenchable by any other means than the unveiling of that which reveals and connects us more and more to the Mystery.

“The path isn’t a straight line.It’s a spiral.You continuously come back to things you thought you understood and see deeper Truths.”

Barry H.Gillespie

We are all on paths leading to the same destination at the same time (now).No path is wrong.No paths are better or more special.It is an inner path that is reflected back to us in our outer lives.

I like to think of everything that happens outside of me as representative of what is going on within me.The people around me, what they are saying and doing,represent aspects of my own self, my own feelings about my own thoughts.My thoughts have led me here:

“When your inner world comes into order, your outer world will come into order.” -I Ching

“Every person you meet is an aspect of yourself, clamoring for love.”

-Eric Michael Leventhal

Right now as I look around and within, taking in the moment…I see that I’m a night owl, surrounded by night owls.I am an escapist, through sleep, sex, distraction, fun. I am connected to music.I am a free thinker.I have a mind of my own.I am a misfit, an outcast, surrounded by the like. I am a lover and maker of music.This is what and whom I see around me and within right in this very moment. I am cluttered.I live passionately, feeling intensely whatever it is that I feel. I am an addict.I love instant gratification, but I question whether this is something to accept or overcome. I want to laugh at my fears and be free and love who I am in the moment…In some moments I have these things…in others I do not.Right now I am somewhere in the middle.

What in me in this moment is clamoring for love? …the Artist, the Writer…the part of me that tries and fails…the part of me that gets stuck.I wonder if I can love that in another can I love it in myself? And in this love and acceptance can I become unstuck? And move on with peace and clarity?

This is your typical day in my mind, the kind of things I wonder to myself when I try to make conscious sense of the moment I find myself in.Sometimes I am at peace.Sometimes I watch the present unfold from a place where my thoughts are a distant ramble, where there is no desire for any particular outcome; where there is a knowing that everything is at is should be and is unfolding perfectly before me.Sometimes I am hopeless and apathetic, disgusted by what some humans have to endure…deeply fearful of what I might have to endure, fearful of past pains repeating. Sometimes I am everything in between.Life is a wild ride.

Earlier, I spoke of the idea of being grateful for my confusion.Why?Because it causes me to be endlessly curious, to seek Truth again and again…to awaken to new perception and experience new levels of peace, joy, and flow.